In the face of declining print revenue, many publishers are adopting paywalls to monetize their content, which require users to either register or pay for access. Paywalls can be categorized as hard or soft, with examples from major publications like The New York Times, which has seen significant increases in subscription rates. While paywalls can generate predictable income and allow for data collection, potential downsides include reduced visitor numbers and the challenge of providing content that justifies the cost to subscribers.

1. Paywall Questions You've Been
Scared to Ask

2. In today's publishing
world, print revenue is
declining due to the
explosion of digital

3. Publishers are left asking one
question...

4. How can we monetize
our content to stay in
business?

5. The answer? Paywalls!

6. Now let’s tackle
those five scary
questions!

7. What is a paywall?
A paywall is a system requiring user
registration and a paid subscription to
access web content

8. Example

9. Paywalls are
divided into
two types
Hard
Soft

10. Hard Soft
By quality By quantity

11. A HARD paywall requires
paid subscription before
any of the content can be
accessed
Pay now

12. A SOFT paywall allows users
to view a specific number of
articles before requiring paid
subscription

13. Who uses paywalls?

14. 350+
Over 350 publications
are using this strategy
for their online content

15. In 2013, digital subscriptions
added more than $100 million
in operating income
Gannett Company implemented
metered (soft) paywalls at 78 of its
newspapers

16. The New York Times

17. Over 1 million digital-only subscribers
Offers bundled subscription offers

18. First, the NY Times
gave a teaser to their
content
They then launched a
soft paywall with
metered access

19. The outcome...

20. 85% higher
subscription rate
January 14' January 15'VS.

22. The streaming video site allows channel holders to
choose a paywall setting on their content
Account Free Trial Partial View Enable DisableBlock Access
Block access until payment is
made

23. This puts
control in the
hands of the
content
creators

24. With paywalls,
income can generate
naturally instead of
depending on
traditional
advertising systems

26. Their soft paywall
allows readers to
view up to 15
articles before being
prompted to pay for
further access

27. What Are the Business
?of Paywalls

28. Additional online revenue
flow not tied to:
*Advertising income
*Print sales
*Other income sources

29. Subscriptions
provide a predictable
income stream to
help smooth out
cash flow

30. The 1st party data collected
from subscribers can be
used to:
Understand the audience
Provide monetized content
Gather metrics to drive ad
sales

31. What are the
Professional
Benefits of
Paywalls?

32. Content with paywalls represents:
Professional journalists
Fact-checked content

33. Subscribers associate
brands using paywalls with
high-quality and unique
content
High Quality

34. Paywall
subscriptions
provide consistent
and predictable
income
Brands can
forecast revenue
and remove income
uncertainty of
unsteady sources
Brands can focus
on ways of
optimizing paywall
access and value

35. Visitors spend more
time on a site with
registration

36. Quaero found that the top
10% of registered users
accounted for 87% of the time
spent on a site

37. These users are
more valuable
when used to
gather first-party
data and website
behavior data

38. What are
the downsides of
paywalls?

39. Visitors are asked to
pay for content they
may have already
accessed for free on
the web

40. The paywalled content
must offer significant
value to attract
subscriber attention

41. Businesses receive less
visitors with gated
content
X
X X
X X
Resulting in a small
registration percentage
Registered users

42. Retention rates
58-90%
Soft
15-20%
Hard

43. Learn more about paywalls,
increasing user
registrations and how it
can impact your bottom
line
Get the report on the next slide

44. Click to download the report!
www.Quaero.com